Nassau Police Union Defends Officer in Hofstra Student Shooting

By

Will James

May 21, 2013 3:05 pm ET

Associated Press

In this photo copied from the 2010 Sleepy Hollow High School yearbook, high school student Andrea Rebello is shown.

The Nassau County police officers’ union said Tuesday that it stands behind an officer’s decision to enter a house where he accidentally shot and killed a Hofstra University student who was being held hostage last week.

“We’re backing that decision 100% that he went into that house,” James Carver, president of the Nassau County Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, said at a news conference. “If he would’ve stayed outside and several people were killed inside that house, he would’ve been criticized for not going in the house.”

The officer, whom police have not identified, was responding to a report of an armed robbery in Uniondale, N.Y., early Friday morning when he shot and killed the student, who was being used as a body shield by a gunman who was trying to escape.

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